By Rafe Calder
In 1887 the British Parliament passed a law about knives. It did not set out to praise anyone.
The Merchandise Marks Act 1887 is where the phrase begins, according to Wikipedia. Foreign makers were stamping inferior goods with the names of well-known British firms, the article says, and most of those goods came from Germany. The Act required that imported goods bearing the name or trade mark of a United Kingdom manufacturer show their country of origin. An order in council could extend the rule to other goods.
What the law was for
The sources give three versions of the purpose. Wikipedia says the Act let British consumers see where goods came from so that they could avoid goods from protectionist economies, and it attributes the Act to a free-trade Liberal government. A translator’s blog, Transblawg, quoting German radio, says the label was meant to signal inferior foreign goods, not good British ones. The German Historical Institute’s web page on the Act, which presents an excerpt of a commentary, frames the law as economic nationalism: British traders and politicians, facing German competition, wanted to appeal to patriotic buyers.
These are not necessarily in conflict. A law can aim at fraud and at competition at once. We put the three side by side and do not weigh them.
What a lawyer wrote in 1888
The commentary, by Howard Payn and published in London by Stevens and Sons in 1888, is a handbook for the Act. It says most offences under it involve a false description of where goods are made. Its example is plain: knives marked “Sheffield” but made in Germany are a clear fraud. Marking goods with a British place name or address is an offence, it says, though adding a clear statement of origin, “manufactured in Germany” for instance, can cure the falseness. Indirect hints, such as English-language descriptions, British-style measures, “& Co.” and royal or national symbols, can also imply British origin on goods from non-English-speaking countries, and the commentary advises a counter-statement of foreign manufacture. It adds that words in another language depend on the country: “Mode de Paris” would be a misdescription on German goods but not on French ones.
The excerpt does not say how the Act was enforced, so we cannot tell you.
The warning that turned
By 1902 the reaction was already being reported. An Austrian Patent Office journal that year carried a news item quoting a Prussian-German conservative newspaper, which said German industry had noted a British lawsuit against English merchants selling English goods bearing the label, and that the German public saw this as proof the Act had backfired. The item claims the label, meant as a deterrent, had become a recommendation. German suppliers kept using it. English makers also applied it without authorisation, the item says, which it describes as unfair competition against German factories. It adds that the law was later softened so that “foreign made” was enough.
That is one newspaper’s view as relayed by another journal, so we read it as a contemporary opinion and not as a measurement.
Transblawg takes the story forward. The label became a mark of quality, it says, and quotes a historian calling the original warning a “Gütesiegel”, a seal of quality. Wikipedia says the label became associated with quality, durability and reliability, and cites several sources for it, without figures.
Who regulates it
No one body does, Wikipedia says: the label’s standing comes from court rulings in Germany. A guidance sheet issued by the Schwerin Chamber of Commerce and Industry says that stating German origin is voluntary in Germany and the European Union, and that imported goods generally need no origin label, except food and drink. Labels are mandatory only for exports to countries that require them.
The sheet cites the Madrid Arrangement, concluded in 1891, under which false or misleading origin designations can lead to customs seizure, and the EU customs code, which defines customs origin and speaks of the “last essential and economically justified processing”. It says the label must not mislead consumers about origin or quality, and is reserved for products whose quality-critical processing took place in Germany. It gives no percentage of value.
Two rulings, two courts
The sheet cites two German court decisions. Stuttgart’s regional court, on 27 February 2003, held the label misleading for a multimedia computer whose essential components were made abroad. The higher regional court in Düsseldorf, on 5 April 2011, held that silverware could carry the label only if mainly produced in Germany, or if its value-giving properties came from German production.
Wikipedia gives different rulings. In 1973 the Federal Court of Justice held that the phrase could not be limited to West German companies, after which “Made in West Germany” and “Made in GDR” were often used. In 1995 the higher regional court in Stuttgart held the term misleading under the fair trade law when most of a product’s value did not come from German raw materials or craftsmanship. The two lists do not overlap, and both concern Stuttgart. We do not merge them.
Where the word stops being clear
Transblawg’s source notes that many current German products are largely made of imported materials, and the blogger compares this with American complaints about foreign-made labels. Our reading: if the law asks for the quality-critical step to be German, then a piece can carry the label and still contain materials from elsewhere. That is our inference from the chamber’s wording, and none of the pages says it in so many words.
Dates in order
- 1887: the Merchandise Marks Act, according to Wikipedia and the Chamber of Commerce sheet.
- 1888: Payn’s commentary published, per the German Historical Institute page.
- 1891: the Madrid Arrangement concluded, according to the sheet.
- 1902: the Austrian journal’s item, per the German Historical Institute page.
- 1973: the Federal Court of Justice ruling, according to Wikipedia.
- 1995: the Stuttgart higher regional court ruling, according to Wikipedia.
- 2003: the Stuttgart regional court ruling, according to the sheet.
- 2011: the Düsseldorf higher regional court ruling, according to the sheet.
Side by side
The encyclopaedia says there is no central regulator. The chamber says the label is voluntary and bound by consumer law. These agree. The encyclopaedia and the blog say the label became a seal of quality, and the 1902 item says the same of its own day. Where they differ is on why the law was passed.
Questions a buyer would ask
Where did the quality-critical step happen? Is a part or a material made elsewhere, and does the seller say so? Does the label say Germany or only the maker’s address? Is a quality seal, a trade mark or a place name being used as well, and what does each ask for? A label of origin is a claim about a process, and the seller should be able to describe the process.
What kind of sources these are
An open encyclopaedia, a translator’s personal blog, an excerpt from an 1888 commentary and a 1902 news item, both hosted by a German Historical Institute history site, and a chamber of commerce guidance sheet. We read no statute, no court judgment and no customs text. The court details come from the chamber’s sheet and from Wikipedia, and the two cite different cases.
What we left out
We left out anything about the label that none of our sources stated. We left out trade statistics, tariff history and the later European rules, because our sources gave them only in passing. We left out the percentage rules some firms quote, since the chamber’s sheet gives none.
Roam first. Shop later.